Lazaro to give second immigration program for exhibit closing

NORTH NEWTON, KAN. – Kauffman Museum at Bethel College will close the current special exhibit “Americans by Choice: The Story of Immigration and Citizenship in Kansas” with a program by a new Bethel staff member.

Caleb Lázaro, multicultural student adviser and resident director of Warkentin Court, will give the second program in conjunction with the exhibit Sunday, Sept. 2, at 3:30 p.m. in the museum auditorium. The program is free and open to the public.

Sept. 2 is also the last day to see “Americans by Choice” at Kauffman Museum – the traveling exhibit will move next to the Eisenhower Presidential Museum and Library in Abilene.

Lázaro will “explore the diverse, peculiar and often times twisted ways in which mainstream American culture has depicted immigrants throughout its history,” he said.

He will speak from his own immigrant experience – he came to California from Peru with his family at age 6 – and hope to “shed some light on what current mainstream cultural notions of the ‘invasive other’ feel like within immigrant communities.”

In addition to being an immigrant himself, before coming to Bethel, Lázaro was a pastor at El Centro, a Colorado Springs, Colo., congregation that includes many immigrants, both documented and undocumented.

Regular Kauffman Museum hours are 9:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Tuesday-Friday, and 1:30-4:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. The museum is closed Mondays and major holidays. Admission to the museum, which also includes admission to the special exhibit “Americans by Choice,” as well as the permanent exhibits “Of Land and People,” “Mirror of the Martyrs” and “Mennonite Immigrant Furniture,” is $4 for adults, $2 for children ages 6-16, and free to Kauffman Museum members and children under 6. For more information, call the museum at 316-283-1612 or visit its website, www.bethelks.edu/kauffman/.

Back to News NORTH NEWTON, KAN. – Kauffman Museum at Bethel College will close the current special exhibit “Americans by Choice: The Story of Immigration and Citizenship in Kansas” with a program by a new Bethel staff member. Caleb Lázaro, multicultural student …